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RE:Framed: Capricious Cookies (and teachers)

I’ve been baking for so many years but I made macarons for the first time ever today. Do you want to know why? Lack of confidence.

I’ve been wanting to make them for a long time, but I let other people influence me.

A lot of people told me:

“Its waay too hard. I made it like 4 times and I failed each time”

“I’m an experienced baker and I messed up on macarons”

I almost didn’t make them because I thought “what’s the point? I’m going to fail the first time anyways”

Thats when my sister told me “if you don’t try this first time, when will you succeed in making them?”

That gave me confidence and pointed out the obvious, I just had to start somewhere to end up anywhere.

After watching at least 600 videos online and reading 20 different recipes with different methods, I decided to give it a go.

I made my own almond flour at home which I found very tedious, since the process of soaking the almonds, peeling the almonds and lastly drying the almonds is so long. I added confectioners sugar to make a dry mix.

I was freaking out a bit while I was fluffing my egg whites because they WEREN’T forming stiff peaks! I had to beat it for about 8 mins(no joke) and I was delighted after I put pink food coloring in there. It made the batter look so pretty!

The macaronge, process of folding the two separate mixes into one, was a very crucial part in making the macarons because it could ALL go wrong here. Over mix and you get flat macarons with no feet. Undermix and you get macarons which are cracked.

The number of folds depends and is different for every batter. I only had to fold my batter 37 times and it was perfect with a lava like consistency. That’s when I stopped and started filling the mixture into a piping bag.

I piped super tiny circles to make mini macarons. I have an obsession for mini things: mini cupcakes, mini macarons, mini excetra…

Anyways, I let it bake for about 10 minutes and was squealing with joy when I found that they had tiny feet and were perfect.

(Appologize for the lighting, it was nighttime and I did the best I could)

I made a chocolate ganache filling for them and I coated some of the shells with a homemade white chocolate glaze.

To sum it up, macarons are NOT hard. Its exaggerated by people who achieved making this delicacy and want some honor and recognition. You don’t have to be a professional baker to make them, you just need to follow the methods and carefully do each step with the correct ammount of ingredients.

Because if you ask me, honestly, the hardest part for me was separating the egg yolks from the egg whites. I ruined 6 eggs before I could succeed!

So what about all those peopel who discouraged me? Did they not read the recipe enough or did they even look at a single Youtube video on how to made them?

This goes back to English and how we have to read the text very closely. Charles Dickens “A Tale of Two Cities” is serious literature. Macarons require serious baking techniques. Like in english how we must read the text extremly closely because my English teacher is capricious and can test you on a day you totally don’t expect, macarons are unpredictable too. Sometimes, no matter how hard you study, the test was designed for you to never pass with a 100%. Same with Macarons, they are easy to make, but sometimes even when the very best measure are take, the macarons might still fail because of different reasons, ex: oven heating, using wax paper instead of PARCHMENT paper.

Just to clear a macaron myth: Macarons don’t only work well on silicon mats, they are just as fine on parchment paper.

So for anyone who hasn’t made macarons yet, go out there and make them! They aren’t as hard as they look and get your friends involved. I originally planned on making this with my friends, but it was thanksgiving break so we couldn’t set on a perfect time convenient for all of us. That’s okay. Sisters do just fine and I think this was a great learning experience for me and I’m glad I succeeded. I think I want to try making chocolate macarons next time!

Thanks! I am proud of myself making these macarons too, and they aren’t impossible to make(look for perfect macaron tips online). You must make them too and show me pictures:) Haha I’m still perfecting my recipes and I am striving to become a professional baker, just like you!!!

P.s. I wasn’t trying to discourage you with my past failures, I was just telling you the truth and to be extra careful! I hope you didn’t get offended, I wasn’t trying to doubt you as a baker Zainab. I love your passion and drive for making delicious treats. BTW, I’m pretty jealous at how well they’ve turned out, but you probably didn’t need me telling you that; you obviously know how good they are. Maybe I’ll have better luck next time?

Melanie! Of course I am not offended. I know that sometimes even when someone tries really hard, they aren’t successful. I am actually glad that you said they were so hard and almost impossible to make because by saying that, you made me take extra precautions and that really made my cookies great! You must believe in yourself that you will succeed and seriously Melanie, I am grateful for having a friend like you. 🙂 🙂 🙂

Great post Zainab! I like how despite the fact that many people have said macarons are difficult to make, you decided to give it a try. Your sister was right when she said, “If you don’t try this first time, when will you succeed in making them?” You never know if you don’t try. Keep up the good work! I look forward to seeing more baking posts. 🙂

Your class, easy? Haha. (If I say it was you’d definitely devise a way to make it more torturous.) I just think I’m beginning to understand a bit on how you grade and what you mainly focus on in your class: At the end of the day, the lessons we learn are more important than the grade we receive.

Wow, your first time making macarons turned out so well, and I love the color too! I made the mistake of not watching enough videos my first time…after that I looked up tons of videos to learn the folding technique haha.